'Affirmative Action,' 'Black' GPAs and the Discourse(s) of Black Intellectual Inferiority

 
'AffirmativeAction,' 'Black' GPAs and the Discourse(s) of Black Intellectual Inferiorityby David J. Leonard | NewBlackMan
The racial culture wars (i.e. thedemonization of black students) are once again raging on college campuses.  A recent study authored by PeterArcidiacono, Ken Spenner, and Esteban M. Aucejo concludes that African Americanstudents are less qualified and academically prepared to succeed at DukeUniversity.  "What Happens AfterEnrollment? An Analysis of the Time Path of Racial Differences in GPA and MajorChoice" cites evidence of African Americans switching from science (STEM)majors to easier liberal arts majors as evidence for a lack ofpreparation. 
Accordingto a group of Duke Alumni, "The study opens with a bold statement thataffirmative action admissions in higher education allow for the collegeadmission of minority students who have 'weak' preparation for college-levelwork.  This implies that studentsof color are not as intelligent or prepared as their white counterparts."  The study is thus not simply an assaulton affirmative action and the struggle for diversity on college campuses, butan effort to reassert notions of white superiority. "Whatmany people of color discovered upon entering those previously closed corridorswas not white superiority but, for the most part, white mediocrity. Now, topreserve such a system, what is often brought up is the mediocrity of blacksand other groups of color who enter," writes LewisGordon. "What is not brought up, however, isthe group of blacks and brown people who were excluded on the basis of theirexcellence. The prevailing view in predominantly white institutions about suchcandidates is fear of whether such candidates are 'controllable.'"  Leaving readers with the conclusionthat blacks are not controllable (and thus not desirable), the study hasdangerous implications.
In relying on and working from aseries of stereotypes and accepted narratives, the study fails to answer anumber of questions that points to both its deficiencies and its danger:
How does the study define blackness; does it differentiatebetween first generation African immigrants or students whose family have beenin the United States?  Does itaccount for class differences?  Intalking about SAT courses, and preparation, how does it account for educationalinequalities, such as differential resources, access to SAT preparationcourses, and the availability of advanced placement courses and countless otherexamples that point to the ways in which racism produce an uneven playingfield?
How does the study account for extracurricular activities,demands of work, student involvement, and engagement with the community?  Are there differences between differentdisciplines?  How does it accountfor the ways that the demands of life, and the potential involvement of studentsas organizers, community leaders, athletes, artists, and active citizensdiffers between the sciences and the liberal arts, and the potential impact ongrades?  How does it explain highrate of entry for black students in STEM majors and how does it account forhigh exit rates? 
In failing to actually talk withstudents and learn from their experiences, in an effort to understand how theinstitutions and higher education is potentially failing, the authors insteadexplain once again put the onus back on black students.  Offering a narrative that focuses on"qualifications," "work ethic," educational unpreparedness, the authors notonly deploy a dominant white racial frame that consistently images whites as superiorand deserving, and blacks as inferior and therefore undeserving, but erases themeaningful ways that racism and white privilege operate in contemporary society
The study works from a premisethat sciences are harder, demand more study time, and are more demanding; theevidence provided for each of these claims is lower grades amongst studentsdespite greater academic preparation. The authors argue at great lengths – "and perhaps related to thedifferences in grading practices, students are working harder in naturalscience and economics classes and perceive these classes to be more challengingthan classes in the humanities and social sciences"—that African Americanstudents are fleeing from harder classes and majors because they cannot handlethem.  Without any evidence, suchclaims should give pause on a number of levels.  The assumptions here are extensive as the authors providelittle evidence that these classes are harder or more demanding; the authorsmerely recycle the assumptions that Schwarz Reflection Principle and HeisenbergUncertainty Principle are far more challenging to students than understandingthe use of metaphors by Shakespeare and Ellison, analyzing Ferdinand deSaussure's idea of signifier and signified within The Matrix, or applying the theories of Karl Marx, Max Weber andWalter Rodney to globalization. 
At the core, the studydemonstrates no understanding of the ways in which race and racism may operatewithin the classroom and within the broader community.  In fact, it shows an inability tounderstand how race and racism impacts the experiences of students color.  For example, they argue, "Whileresearchers have documented lower grades for black students in college (see,for example, Betts and Morell 1999), this is to be expected given differencesin college preparation."  Evidenceof their failures to look beyond numbers, and the tendency toward reductionistthinking (differential college preparation=low grades), the study erases thelarger context and processes that impacts grades.  Had the researchers actually talked with students they mayhave gotten a better understanding as to how their experiences, as AfricanAmerican in predominantly white classrooms at a predominantly white institutionwith predominantly white male professors, may have figured in their decision toswitch majors. 
A study – "CriticalRace Theory, Racial Microaggressions, and Campus Racial Climate: TheExperiences of African American College Students"by Daniel Solorzano, Miguel Ceja, Tara Yoss – found that black studentsexperience ample discrimination and prejudice (microaggressions) during theiracademic classroom experiences.  Citingexpressed low expectations, negative interactions with white peers, segregationfrom other white students in class, isolation, discrimination from joiningstudy groups, and a culture of diminishment, these authors illustrate theprofound ways that race operates within the college classroom.  I cite two of their examples tohighlight how race and racism might account for the switching of majors
An African American female statedthat racial discrimination in study group formation was obvious: I've had timeswhen a guy in the class ... [said], "Well, I don't want to work with youbecause you're Black." And he told me to my face.... And it was upsetting'cause ... I came here thinking that it wouldn't be like this, and that wasnaive.
Another African American femalerecalled a friend's experience: [A Black male student] thought he was going tobe pre-med. And he was in this chemistry lab, and nobody wanted him to be inthe [work] groups, so his partner [sic]. . . turned out to be this deaf girl.I'm sure everybody's looking at them like, "They're never going topass."
The authors conclude with thisobservation:
Several of the students we interviewed indicated that beyond feeling likea numerical minority, they also felt personally diminished by nonverbalmicroaggressions perpetrated by their White counterparts. Other students agreedthat merely "looking like" a person of color can be cause for Whiteprofessors, students, and college staff persons to draw negative assumptionsabout minorities and lower their expectations of them. They further recognizedthat being stereotyped carries very real consequences beyond feeling bad aboutoneself. Some indicated feeling "drained" by the intense scrutinytheir everyday actions received in the context of negative preconceived notionsabout African Americans. Others acknowledged as racial microaggressions thesubtle and overt daily put-downs they encountered-or attempted to avoid-intheir interactions with some Whites in the academic setting. Such incidents putthese African American college students on the defensive to keep fromsuccumbing to stereotype threat.
Stereotype Threat,an idea popularized by Claude Steele, describes the ways that anxieties andfears that failure will confirm negative stereotypes, dramatically hindersperformance.  Sandy Daritysummarizes the importance of stereotype threat in his critical response to theauthors' study,  citing Steele andAronson (1995), who found that black students under stereotype threat scored 13percent worse than those under no threat at all.  They also found that those under threat answered questionsat a much slower rate than those students not subjected to the threat.  This study fails to consider the waysin which the stereotype threat may impact academic success within the sciencesand how this same stereotype threat impacts test scores as well pointing to itsoverall ignorance about racism and white privilege on and off campus.   
In recycling bell curve,anti-affirmative arguments, that isolate or particularize black movement from STEM majors to humanitiesrather than reflecting on the larger trend; one might instead argue that the  sciences fail to retain students.  Whether reflecting bad pedagogy, anelitist desire to weed students out of particular majors, shifts inprofessional goals (leaving the sciences after deciding against pre-med), orthe curricular banality, the sciences are systematically failing to maintainits students. In "WhyScience Majors Change Their Minds (It's Just So Darn Hard),"Christopher Drew explores the issues here:
Studies have found that roughly 40 percent of studentsplanning engineering and science majors end up switching to other subjects orfailing to get any degree. That increases to as much as 60 percent whenpre-medical students, who typically have the strongest SAT scores and highschool science preparation, are included, according to new data from theUniversity of California at Los Angeles. That is twice the combined attritionrate of all other majors.
The failure of this study toaccount for the reasons why students may choose a field in the humanities oversciences reflects its methodological choices.  Its focus on statistical analysis, and its operating througha series of assumptions, might have been complicated the authors actuallytalked to students.  Within a recentNew York Times article, Mr. Drewchronicles the experiences of one such student:
MATTHEW MONIZ bailed out of engineering at Notre Dame in thefall of his sophomore year. He had been the kind of recruit most engineeringdepartments dream about. He had scored an 800 in math on the SAT and in the700s in both reading and writing. He also had taken Calculus BC and five otherAdvanced Placement courses at a prep school in Washington, D.C., and had longplanned to major in engineering.
But as Mr. Moniz sat in his mechanics class in 2009, herealized he had already had enough. "I was trying to memorize equations, andengineering's all about the application, which they really didn't teach toowell," he says. "It was just like, 'Do these practice problems, then you're onyour own.' " And as he looked ahead at the curriculum, he did not see muchrelief on the horizon.
So Mr. Moniz, a 21-year-old who likes poetry and had enjoyedintroductory psychology, switched to a double major in psychology and English,where the classes are "a lot more discussion based." He will graduate in Mayand plans to be a clinical psychologist. Of his four freshman buddies at NotreDame, one switched to business, another to music. One of the two who is stillin engineering plans to work in finance after graduation.
The above points to the complexreasons why students may chose one major over another, none of which hasanything to do with the ease of humanities compared to sciences, the yearningfor better grades, or an unwillingness to work.  In this instance Mr. Moniz points to the pedagogicaldifferences between the sciences and humanities, an important factor givenresearch on pedagogy and the best practices, much of which points to thelimitations of traditional lectures (studies have shown that students retainbetween 20-40 percent of material presented during a lecture). 
The failure tolook at the sciences themselves, to deploy stereotypes about black students andrehash ideas about the difficult sciences, points to the failures of thisstudy.  Yet, this study isreceiving national attention. Articles have appeared in countless newspapers, which cite its findingsas evidence for a larger narrative about white preparedness and blackeducational deficiencies.  It isdangerous because of its conclusion and because of how it reinforces dominantstereotypes and narratives. 
Lewis Gordonrecently asked, "What's the problem with affirmative action?" The Duke study attempts to answer that with flawedanalysis, and flawed conclusions, all based on a flawed approach.  Sandy Darity, in "Affirmative ActionGrumbles," summarizes Gordon's rhetorical responses: "First, when implemented,'it works.' Second, its very existence forces the society that has adopted itto acknowledge that it continues to be a site where racism and discriminationoperate – not past discrimination but current, ongoing discrimination. Makingsuch an admission may be the source of the biggest grumbles of all."  No matter what the study says, it failsbecause it neither acknowledges the profound ways that affirmative action isworking and the ways in which racism and discrimination remain inoperation.  One has to look nofurther than this study to see how race and stereotypes remain a salient issuein our society. 
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David J. Leonard is Associate Professor in the Department of CriticalCulture, Gender and Race Studies at Washington State University, Pullman. Hehas written on sport, video games, film, and social movements, appearing inboth popular and academic mediums. His work explores the political economy ofpopular culture, examining the interplay between racism, state violence, andpopular representations through contextual, textual, and subtextualanalysis.  Leonard's latest book After Artest: Race and the Assault onBlackness will be published bySUNY Press in May of 2012.

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